FiringSquad - Consolitis Editorial

Originally Posted by zakhal
Consolitis exists because people buy console games way more than pc games. And for higher prices even. Most people dont want pc games.

This is only half of the truth.

Another part lies in both publishers & developers believing in consoles = less pirating.

-- “ Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.“ (E.F.Schumacher, Economist, Source)

Originally Posted by Lucky Day
Making money should be a side effect of game development, not the reason for doing it in the first place.

not sure if this is a lie or just plain ignorance on how the industry has worked over the past 35 years.

It's because they just do, they don't have ANY deeper philosophy behind what they do, imho.

For example, if a gme is created with the main reason to make money with it, then the "fun factor" is merely [i]a tool[/i9 which you usein order to gain more money from this game.

This is like turning humanity-related aspects of a game - like this "fun factor" - into tools - thus to "de-humanize" games.

A game becomes nothing but a tool for gaining money.

It's the same with firms and with companies : You can regard them as bnothing but tools to gain money - ih you as their chief. Sell tghe company - and you wallet becomes full ! Enough money for the next years ! - What becomes of the employees doesn't matter - if the man reason for builing up a company is to mak it so big that it gives you a big earning when you sell it.

Thus, current economics are de-humanize the world. Everything becomes measured against "making money" or "spending money". Making emnployees is then nothing but a conventient too to make even more money - because happy employees bring more money into the firm's wallet, so to say.

If the employees get their fair share of it, then this is a bit different. But still there is the danger of turning game aspects like "ccuteness" or "fun" into tools with the gol to get more money for this game.

This is imho very much like "Black Marketing" : People are getting exploited, becaue thy are seen as nothing but cash-cowds which can be milked. Not s humans anymore.

And THIS is where Philosophy leads to. And no-one notices it, because no-one does Philosophy. Nobody really THINKS - companies and their employees just DO.

-- “ Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.“ (E.F.Schumacher, Economist, Source)

There's risk-pooling involved as well. It makes perfect sense to me that game developers - and more importantly - the people investing in game developers - would want to make games tailored for consoles.

Face it- PC gamers are a pretty small niche of the public, and many tech savvy PC users just pirate stuff. Consoles on the other hand have the advantage of marketing, getting a familiar bright green Xbox logo on the packaging in a dedicated section of the store with all the other Xbox games and Microsoft's point of sale signage and merchandising. Plus there's the assurance that you can pop it in your Xbox and it will JUST WORK.

I know the argument is that PC gaming isn't as complex as it is made out to be. But those arguments are generally made by people who are fairly PC savvy. A mom or dad doesn't want to buy a PC game as a gift for their kid and have to figure out if their home PC will run it. Of course there are exceptions to this rule, but the truth is the vast majority of the public who want to play games aren't all that interested in f*Cking around with their aging PC they keep in the spare room just to have fun.

So if you had a good chunk of money to invest in a games company, why on earth would you give it to a developer who's going to make a complex RPG for the PC, versus someone making a more mainstream RPG for a console?

It's not about "dumbing down" or "console kiddies" or "not caring" or "spitting in the face of PC gamers" it's about risk aversion and risk-pooling.

Ovenall, You keep on enjoying what ever Bio pumps out to the masses .There are plenty of action Rpg out there for you . Developers still are making RPGs that are not watered down to fit the console market you just have to look for them. I want an RPG with complex character creation with a million spells and lots of dialog . Is that o.k with you. Mass Effect was very forgettable . To me the Big Publishers dont know jack about what the audience wants. They really only know what they have been successful in selling to them in the past, its not some genius of marketing or oracular vision, its the simple case of going for the lowest hanging fruit on the tree.

But come on, what percentage of the public do YOU think are PC gamers? Then there's PC gamers of different types. There's plenty of people playing the Sims. But what percentage of the number of PC gamers play complex RPGs?

And dude, just do a google search for "[name of popular PC game]" and "torrent." If you can install a new graphics card, chances are you can figure out how to download a cracked version of a popular PC game. I said many pirate - I didn't say all or most.

Originally Posted by rich ruffo
Ovenall, You keep on enjoying what ever Bio pumps out to the masses .There are plenty of action Rpg out there for you . Developers still are making RPGs that are not watered down to fit the console market you just have to look for them. I want an RPG with complex character creation with a million spells and lots of dialog . Is that o.k with you. Mass Effect was very forgettable . To me the Big Publishers dont know jack about what the audience wants. They really only know what they have been successful in selling to them in the past, its not some genius of marketing or oracular vision, its the simple case of going for the lowest hanging fruit on the tree.

What the hell are you going on about?

I'd ALSO like "…an RPG with complex character creation with a million spells and lots of dialog". I'd also like a couple million dollars and a nice ocean view house in Miami Beach.

I'm just explaining why consoles are so tremendously successful and attractive to investors and developers.

For the record- I like playing PC games and wish there were more and better PC (and console) RPGs. I'm just explaining my view as to why there aren't many of them.

But come on, what percentage of the public do YOU think are PC gamers?

And dude, just do a google search for "[name of popular PC game]" and "torrent." If you can install a new graphics card, chances are you can figure out how to download a cracked version of a popular PC game. I said many pirate - I didn't say all or most.

Since you mentioned Google, this is one of the first links I found when searching for "pc console markets comparative study" :

Gaming PCs outsell all consoles combined twice over

The PC Gaming Alliance has announced some of the results of a giant research project which claims that more gaming-capable PCs were sold in 2009 than all consoles on the market (not including handhelds).

Indeed, PCs outsold home consoles at a ratio larger than 2-to-1 last year, with revenues totaling $54.6 billion. That brings their total number to 212.6 million worldwide. PCGA expects those numbers to reach $61.3 billion and 322 million in the next 5 years. For comparison's sake, there are currently 73 million Wiis, 41.7 million Xbox 360s, and 36.3 million PlayStation 3s out there.

Your claim about PC savvy users being all/mostly/whatever pirates is as futile, but I don't blame you entirely.

Originally Posted by Karmapowered
Gaming PCs outsell all consoles combined twice over

The PC Gaming Alliance has announced some of the results of a giant research project which claims that more gaming-capable PCs were sold in 2009 than all consoles on the market (not including handhelds).

So gaming PCs outsell consoles but console games outsell PC games. Unless PC gamers just play less games Id say it awfully looks like PC has more piracy.

Originally Posted by Ovenall
Heh, Starcraft 2 and WoW accounted for "14 percent of the total PC game sales during the year. (2010)"

And considering two pc games make 14% of all sales the average sales figure for pc game is even less.

-- “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” - Maya Angelou
"Those who dont read history are destined to repeat it."– Edmund Burke

Top ten PC games sold in 2009. The only one that would be discussed here is Dragon Age (which is hated by many here anyway) and that's behind THREE Sims games THREE WoW games/expansions and Spore, which was released an entire year prior to DA (which admittedly came out late in the year).

Retail sales of all games in 2009 was $10.5 billion. Of that, $538 million in 2009 was for PC, down 23 percent from the year prior. Console games declined 8%.

So what sales for Pc games are down , we know. You expect us to go buy a console for it. Dont hate DA , I hate the greed from the company and i hate people that think they are smarter than everyone else dont you ?